ACT Alliance

Humanitarian Protection

Since the 1990s there has been an unprecedented increase in the protection needs of those we seek to assist. In particular, deliberate or indiscriminate attacks during armed conflicts that kill, injure and forcibly displace civilians; the increase in the use of rape as a strategy of war, the recruitment and abduction of boys and girls as child soldiers and sexual slaves, and persistent sexual exploitation and abuse and other gender-based violence such as rape, female genital mutilation, forced child and teenage marriages and domestic violence. ACT is acutely aware of the need to meet these challenges by encouraging and assisting its members in their efforts to provide more effective protection to crisis-affected communities, particularly for women, girls and young men who are disproportionately affected by violence, coercion, deprivation and abuse. In keeping with this core aim, the purpose of this policy is to strengthen ACT Alliance’s commitment to the protection of women, girls, boys and men in its humanitarian assistance programmes and to provide a definition, framework and principles for the community-based protection work of the ACT members, ACT partners and ACT national and regional forums.